


Bitty Baggins, or Boston and back again

by xerampelinae



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Gen, M/M, implications of reincarnation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-17
Updated: 2016-04-17
Packaged: 2018-06-02 21:38:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,414
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6583510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xerampelinae/pseuds/xerampelinae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Samwell Men’s Hockey Team goes on an adventure that culminates in finding the Arkenstone at the MFA. Featuring gameday MBTA traffic that recalls Mirkwood and its elves, the buddy system, and implications of reincarnation across fictional universes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bitty Baggins, or Boston and back again

It happens because of Johnson in the lull between the second and third round of midterms, the spring of Bitty’s sophomore year. It’s April, enough time for all of them to calm down a little bit from midterms, except for Ransom, whose exam anxiety means campus security expects to see him in the bio lab outside of the last couple weeks before finals, cramming relentlessly for lab practicals.

Bitty’s, well, he’s hovering since Betsy’s not doing so well, there’s a month left before Jack and Shitty graduate, and he really needs these chocolate chip cookies. It’s a Monday morning--unbelievably, they’re all awake after only getting back at 1 a.m. from any away game that they won, how swawsome is that?--and about half of the team is still about the Haus, either skipping class or just not having it.

“Lards,” Shitty says, clearly baked.

“Shits,” Lardo says back, equally baked.

“You know you’re like, a diamond in a bro? A blue diamond bro?”

“Aw Shits, thanks bro.”

“I want to show you how much you mean to me bro. Johnson, like, sent me a link to a travelling exhibit. I want to show you Le Coeur de la Mer.”

“Bro what?”

“Lards, you’re totally the diamond in Titanic. One entire diamond bro.”

“Bro.”

Then they assemble the usual crew from the Haus. Bitty gets dragged from the kitchen, clutching open, venting ziplocs of hot chocolate chip cookies. Jack is summoned in the name of bros and art, packing his camera bag. Ransom and Holster are just down for the trip. (“We haven’t been to Boston since what, January?”

“Yeah, Rans, just a little before the hellstorms hit.”

“Wouldn’t hellstorms be hot, like infernally so?”

“The seventh circle of hell is an icy wasteland with satan frozen in the middle of it.”

“Bro.”)

Chowder, Nursey, and Dex are found wandering campus together and quietly (for them) swallowed up by the group. “Swawsome!” Chowder says; Bitty doesn’t think he’s managed to make it to Boston yet, even though he’s been almost two semesters at Samwell.

Even Johnson agrees to join in, to meet them at Park Street when they switch to the Green Line. Unless, he texts, his part in the plot is resolved for the time being. Bitty is a bit confused by that.

The Samwell-Cambridge bus isn’t anything unusual. They’ve hit Boston together before, outside of games at TD Garden. The snow is diminished at this point (but not gone-gone, Lord does Bitty miss Georgia’s heat. It’s been below freezing for too many days in a row). Bitty restrains himself distracted by the cold air belying the bright, blue sky, but Shitty and Lardo hiss at Cambridge as they walk from where the bus drops them and the appropriate entrance to the T. (“Pretension!” Shitty hisses. “MIT! Harvard Law!”

“Get wrecked, white boys,” Lardo hisses. 

“Get wrecked,” the team immediately echoes, equally vehement.)

Getting into the Alewife is a noisy and rowdy affair, so perfectly normal. The pile-up at the turnstiles is resolved more smoothly than Bitty might have expected, considering that out of their crowd, there are maybe two locals, and Samwell is far enough away to make weekend clubbing in Boston something of an affair.

Red Line trains have enough seating that half the team sits in a clump at the end of the train and the rest of them smile--or glare, in Dex’s case, at a smug Nursey with his arm around Chowder, or look awkwardly at Bitty and his morose consideration of the cookies Betsy barely managed to finish, in Jack’s case, hand stilling his camera bag--down at them as the car rocks underfoot and they all bump knees.

It’s when they switch lines at Park that things go a bit off. Bitty gets distracted from a text from Johnson--whatever area he was coming from was relying on shuttle service because of how wrecked the Red Line was, and somehow Johnson got turned around? But that was okay because Johnson had already given them all a bit of a nudge? Bitty was confused--and bumps into Jack. Like the rest of the team, Jack is studying the way the platform is packed with an awful lot of red and blue gear.

“Shits,” Lardo says. “Is there a Red Sox game today?”

“Shit,” Shitty says. “Okay guys, time to buddy up. Grab at least one person.”

“Best friend buddy system?” Holster says, practically sparkling in the artificial station light.

“Yes!” Ransom says, and Bitty watches Ransom and Holster execute a high-five with their off hands. It is entirely possible that they were already holding hands before the buddy system was activated, Bitty thinks, they’re Ransom and Holster. 

By the time Bitty turns his attention back to the rest of the team, Lardo and Shitty have gotten their shades down and their arms around each other, the frogs have formed a tightly linked chain with a flustered if pleased Chowder in the middle, and Jack is looking down at him inquisitively. 

“Shall we?” Jack says. For a moment, Bitty has an abrupt sense of déjà-vu--which does not make sense, the heat and lighting of Park Street is nothing like in the Haus kitchen--that lights up a blush as easily as a flour-dusted Jack had. Helplessly, Bitty nods. Jack rests a hand on Bitty’s back and begins guiding him through the packed platform. As always when in the company of so many tall men in crowds, Bitty marvels at how much easier it is to make it through a crowd than when of average height.

As soon as they break through the worst of the crowd Shitty shouts, “It’s gonna leave! Go! Go! Go!”

It’s a quick, clear sprint to get aboard, less than across the rink, but Bitty’s feeling slightly dazed by the time it’s over and stumbles a little when the train jerks and pulls away from the station. Jack looks at him dubiously, says, “You should eat more protein,” and retrieves a ziploc of Bitty’s cookies from his camera bag.

“I’m fine,” he says, “really. Just not much sleep.”

Jack stares Bitty down into one of the seats. Feeling a little cowed, Bitty begins eating. The team is looking down at him with varying levels of concern, standing despite the relative abundance of seats. Lardo is particularly high up, peering over Shitty’s shoulder. Chowder looks a bit worried, squeezing his buddies’ hands; they both look a little confused but Dex looks a little flustered (Nursey says, “Chill, dude,” which as usual has the opposite effect on Dex, but Chowder’s grip seems to have an overall calming effect).

“You sure, Bitty?” Lardo asks. Bitty’s mama raised him too politely to speak with his mouth open, so he just nods and watches the team relax marginally. Eventually the team’s focus drifts and they break down into smalltalk. Shitty and Lardo each eat their way through a ziploc of cookies--Shitty complaining about the crumbs in his hair and Lardo protesting by clambering all the way up to Shitty’s shoulders--before the train announces their stop and begins to slow.

“Grab your buddies!” Shitty commands. “Show me your hands!”

Bitty stands and raises his fists, Lardo fistbumps the roof, Chowder raises his hands (and Dex and Nursey’s by extension) like he’s won by getting two buddies (and maybe he has), Ransom and Holster cheer and raise their linked hands, and Jack takes a picture of them all.

“C’mon, Jack,” Shitty says. “Rule number one of the buddy system is to not let go of your buddy.”

“Sorry, Shits,” Jack says, and sets a bracing hand on Bitty’s shoulder just as the train shakes to a stop. “Lead the way.”

Bitty feels warm as they all pile out, then abruptly cold. It’s a beautiful day, blue-skyed but cold. It’s warm enough that the snowmelt reveals just how wrecked the snowfall had left the city.

“Holy shit,” Shitty says, taking in the broken-up segments of road and sidewalk. “Boston got #rekt.”

“Bro,” Lardo says. “I could hear the hashtag on that.”

Meanwhile, Bitty is shivering his cute (but sadly flat) butt. He’s thinking about New Years’ Resolutions and gaining a beaut of a hockey butt when something descends on his shoulders and realizes that he’s being zipped into someone’s jacket.

“Jack???” Bitty says.

“You need to eat more protein, Bittle,” Jack says.

“No, Jack, I mean you just zipped my arms up too.”

They both pause to study this conundrum. Normally, the comparative bulk of Jack would mean that Bitty could totally wriggle and get his arms free, but Bitty’s wearing a sweater too many to do that.

“Oh,” Jack says. There’s a weird shutter sound (Lardo and Ransom take pictures at roughly the same second) before Jack unzips the jacket enough to sort Bitty’s arms out.

“I’m a jellyfish,” Bitty says, flopping the overlong sleeves. He’s definitely ignoring the blush that’s taken over his face.

“Children and jellyfish,” Shitty says, “let’s move out.”

-

They do make it across the street to the MFA eventually. Shitty and Lardo, as resident locals, confidently cross between clusters of cars spaced too closely for Bitty’s comfort. The rest of them wait meekly or patiently for the crosswalk with Bitty. By the time they’ve all bought their tickets, Lardo has abandoned her perch to triangulate the exhibit’s location.

“Sorry it’s the last day of the exhibit, bro,” Shitty says. 

“It’s okay, Shits,” Lardo says, and determinedly knocks her forehead affectionately against Shitty’s.

“Lards,” Shitty says, teary-eyed with fondness and/or pain, Bitty’s not sure.

“What.” Jack says, and shares a dubious look with Bitty. They shrug at each other and follow Shitty and Lardo down the hallway.

-

“Wow,” Bitty says, starry-eyed at the sight of the exhibit, which announces itself as ICONIC. Jack lifts his camera to catch Shitty and Lardo oohing and aahing over the prop necklace from Titanic. Admittedly, Bitty thinks, it is a gorgeous necklace. But with Shitty and Lardo’s oddly sustained focus, he wasn’t that interested in getting a closer look, so he wandered off.

The Necronomicon. Inigo Montoya’s sword--Bitty can admit he sniffed a little. The One Ring, Bitty didn’t spend that long a time looking; Ransom and Holster were looking a little too giggly and devious and oh, dear. Even a collection of watches that had shown up on the wrists of the various James Bonds. Then there was a cat collar right next to a pocket watch; it took Bitty reading the little plaque to figure that one out, but he got a good laugh over Orion’s belt before Agent J’s watch made him sad again.

Eventually, Bitty wanders to the back of the darkened exhibit hall, where overhead lights revealed a sword--Thorin’s Orcrist--and a many-faceted gem. The gem probably wouldn’t have held Bitty’s interest for long, however large and pretty it was, if Jack hadn’t appeared at his shoulder, but Jack does. After a minute, Bitty begins to feel awkward and a little bored.

“Jack?” he says, peering up in the half-light. Jack’s face is a strange thunderous longing that uncomfortably recalls the way he was with Bitty, back in first year. “Jack?”

Jack’s focus slides from the gem--the Arkenstone, apparently the exhibit curators got the one used in the film, or maybe a concept version--to Bitty’s face and visibly shakes himself. “Bitty?”

“Are you okay, Jack?” Bitty asks. Jack looks disturbed by whatever thoughts Bitty had pulled him from.

“I-I don’t know.”

Bitty looks about the hall, where the remainder of the team seems to be similarly mesmerized by various pieces. When he glances back at Jack, he finds that they’ve come to similar conclusions: something weird is going on, and they need to get the team and get out.

“How about you get Ransom and Holster, I’ll go for the Frogs, then regroup for Shitty and Lardo?” Bitty says. Jack nods and they split up.

It turns out the Frogs are admiring Xena’s armor and her chakram--Bitty discovers a deep desire to marathon Xena instead of studying--and are easy to coax away. Bitty doesn’t even have to look too exhausted to get the attention of Chowder (and by extension, Dex and Nursey, even if Dex tenses since Nursey keeps saying, “Chill, dude.” Bitty’s not sure if he’s even doing it on purpose at this point or if it’s just habit).

Jack turns out to have had similar success with Ransom and Holster. “They didn’t seem as...into it,” Jack says when Bitty asks. 

Bitty glances around the exhibit. “Nothing really from what Holster gets into. Mostly movies.”

Jack shrugs and they wordlessly switch gears to Lardo and Shitty. Unbelievably, they’re still by the Heart of the Ocean. Jack and Bitty exchange a series of unsure shrugs before they send Ransom and Holster in for Lardo (“It’ll be easier to get them one at a time, right?” Bitty says).

Lardo’s hiss of “Buddy system” is audible from across the room before Ransom and Holster retreat.

“She’s not wrong,” Holster says.

Exchanging glances, Jack and Bitty square their shoulders and make their own approach. “Shitty?” Jack says.

“Hey bro,” Shitty says without really looking up.

“Brother,” says Lardo.

“What?” Bitty says.

Lardo and Shitty blink and shake themselves the way Jack had, and as weirded out as Bitty feels, he also feels relieved.

“Dude, what did you just call Jack?” Shitty asks.

“Shits, I don’t even know,” Lardo says, looking lost.

“Guys,” Bitty says. “There’s something really weird about this place. I think we should go.”

Shitty and Lardo both nod at this, summoning the rest of the team.

“Let’s head out,” Jack says. Strangely still buddied up, the Samwell Men’s Hockey Team makes its departure.

-

It’s a good thing that Bitty distributes the remainder of his cookies when they get on the T, since they managed to leave the MFA right around when the game at Fenway finishes.

“Oh Lord,” Bitty says, staring at the flood of Red Sox fans. “No fighting.”

“Grab your buddy,” Shitty says, then the doors open and the team is swept apart in the crush.

-

“Forgetting what Lardo said,” Bitty says, when the train has continued on towards Park Street, “I didn’t know you were into The Hobbit.”

“It was good,” Jack says, “though I enjoyed The Lord of the Rings more. But why did they have props for a book in that exhibit?”

“Jack,” says Bitty. “Are you chirping me?”

**Author's Note:**

> Assembled Avengers:  
> Bitty as Bilbo Baggins  
> Jack as Thorin Oakenshield  
> Shitty as Dwalin  
> Lardo as Dis  
> Ransom as Kili  
> Holster as Fili   
> Dex as Dori  
> Nursey as Nori  
> Chowder as Ori  
> Johnson as Gandalf  
> The MBTA as Mirkwood  
> Red Sox fans as elves  
> The Arkenstone as itself
> 
> If you were curious, this fic is set Monday, 4/13/15, when there was a game at Fenway (my school is on the Fenway, and believe me, traffic gets bad on games and after that winter the city was (and still is) fucking wrecked). It’s possible I did too much research for tiny details. The travelling museum exhibit ICONIC is fictional, although it would be really fucking cool if it did exist.   
> Thanks to Mynuet for talking through this concept with me. I hope I’ve done it justice.


End file.
